Aurora Health Care sustained its share of bumps the past two years, including reorganizing management, ending its pension plan, freezing hiring and eliminating jobs.

More recently, Aurora sent shock waves through the state health care industry with the late-2013 announcement that it is discussing possible partnerships with UW Health of Madison.

So when Aurora was looking to fill a key spot on its management team — chief operating officer — well-rounded experience was a priority and so were diplomatic skills.

Enter Gerard Colman, a 43-year-old native of metropolitan New York City with management experience in both an academic medical setting and an urban hospital. Colman is talkative yet ever-so-diplomatic.

During an interview at Aurora’s corporate headquarters in Milwaukee’s Walker’s Point area, Colman was quick to suggest incumbent members of Aurora’s upper management team had better answers to questions and declined to stray too far beyond an overview of his new role.

For example, when asked about the role he will play in Aurora’s discussion with UW Health, especially given his decade of experience at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, he said: “I do bring background in those areas, but I wouldn’t say I’d be brought in for discussions as the chief operating officer. There will be people that do that for a living.”

Colman said he might get involved if and when discussions were further along and then more to “operationalize what happens.”

In spite of Colman’s modest appraisal of the role he started Feb. 3, Aurora chief executive officer Dr. Nick Turkal has high hopes for his new hire. The chief operating officer position has been open since Sue Ela left Aurora in May 2012; Steve Bablitch filled the role on an interim basis and remains with the organization.

Colman has financial, clinical and operational experience and has worked closely with physicians, Turkal said.

“We always look for good chemistry and how a new executive will work with our senior team,” Turkal said via email. “Gerard is genuine and approachable; he has a diplomatic yet ‘get it done’ style that will enable him to be successful working with the myriad people in our organization.”

Colman will focus largely on leading the operations of Wisconsin’s largest health care system and the largest private-sector employer in the Milwaukee area. He also will serve on the management team in strategic planning for improving the existing Aurora business and any extensions of the system’s footprint.

Turkal said Colman is approaching the COO job methodically and thoroughly.

“He is taking the appropriate time to see how the pieces should work together prior to formulating an action plan,” Turkal said.

“It’s a daunting task, but one we strongly believe (Colman) can help lead us through,” Turkal said.

VISION CHANGE

Any time Aurora makes a change in its top management ranks, health care industry executives in southeastern Wisconsin take notice. While Colman describes his challenges in vanilla terms, Jim Mueller of employee benefits consulting firm Mueller QAAS LLC in Waukesha believes Colman’s background could very well contribute to the UW Health talks.

“I think there’s a vision of change,” Mueller said. “I think you bring somebody in from the outside to execute that.”

A colleague of Colman’s at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston said Colman does possess an understanding of academic health care that could be valuable in a possible Aurora-UW Health partnership.

“He’s a pretty outgoing guy — a real supporter of young people in the health care workforce,” said Dr. Tom Burke, Anderson’s executive vice president and physician-in-chief.

Colman is a clean-cut Navy veteran and the son of Irish immigrants. He loves running and recently returned from a family vacation in the U.S. Virgin Islands’ St. Thomas with his wife, Susan, and three daughters.

Colman so far is impressed with the Aurora organization.

“I don’t think there’s anything that would be considered a major challenge,” he said. “I think a lot of it’s opportunity to work with the team that’s here in furthering the health care continuum and the integration across Wisconsin and northern Illinois and really work with team that’s in place.”

Gerard Colman

Title: Chief operating officer at Aurora Health Care

Age: 43

Family: Wife, Susan, a homemaker, and three daughters

Education: Bachelor’s degree in health care management from Southern Illinois University; master’s degree in hospital administration from The New School in New York; doctorate in health care management from University of Texas School of Public Health

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